Fundacja im. Stefana Batorego

Alcohol and Drug Program

The program, operating since 1996, promotes Polish experiences in dependency therapy and prevention, as well as rehabilitation of domestic violence offenders in the countries of Central-Eastern Europe, Central Asia and southern Caucasus. We cooperate with non-governmental organizations and public administration in the countries of these regions to help implement treatment and prevention methods proven in Poland. We organize trainings, internships and study visits, and publish materials that raise qualifications of dependency therapists.

Atlantis program: therapy for incarcerated alcoholics

Since 1996, we have trained specialists and worked with penal services in the countries of program’s operation, helping to establish Atlantis programs within their correctional facilities. The program brought from the U.S. to Poland in 1990-1992, with the help of Batory Foundation, currently operates in 20 Polish correctional facilities. It is based on the AA 12 step philosophy and cooperation with Anonymous Alcoholics groups working to get sober. Our assistance has given rise to Atlantis programs in correctional facilities in Kyrgyzstan (with its own international training center in Bishkek), Bulgaria, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, and Latvia. Professional therapeutic staffs as well as budding Atlantis centers function in several penitentiary facilities in Ukraine (in Lviv and Kyiv) and in Russia (Angarsk in Siberia, St. Petersburg, Samara).
In 2007, we organized trainings in Poland for penitentiary staff from Bulgaria, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Lithuania, Russia and Ukraine (25 individuals), trainings in Georgia for personnel from three correctional facilities (40 individuals) and a cycle of trainings at the training center in Kyrgyzstan for personnel from penitentiary facilities where dependency rehabilitation centers are not yet operating (14 individuals). In addition, we organized internships at Polish Atlantis centers for seven individuals from Bulgaria and Georgia and two study visits in Poland for six people from Georgia and Kyrgyzstan.

Siberia project

Since 2005, we have worked with specialists in drug dependency as well as the AA community in Siberia and far-eastern Russia. Our efforts have resulted in the establishment of consultation desks, hotlines, and sociotherapy centers working with AA and Al-Anon groups in Irkutsk, Angarsk, Ulan-Ude, Khabarovsk, Nahodka, Vladivostok and Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. Our on-site partners that help to organize trainings and operate therapeutic facilities for dependents and codependents include staff of Polish Catholic missions in Irkutsk, Blagoveshchensk, Ulan-Ude and on Kamchatka.
In 2007, we organized two seminars, run by Polish trainers: in Vladivostok, on dependency as an illness of the whole family, and in Ulan-Ude, capital of the Buryat Republic, on working with youth and preventing drug dependency, for about 100 individuals; two cycles of lectures and meetings run by trainers from Poland and Russia in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and Magadan with the participation of about 60 individuals, as well as a cycle of workshops Drug addiction - prevention and treatment at the Irkutsk University run by staff on the Polish MONAR from Warsaw. Further, 29 psychologists, narcologists and dependency therapy instructors from Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Georgia, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan participated in seminars and internships organized in Poland and Russia as well as at the Regional Summer School in Lviv.
For two years, we have been supporting the establishment in Russia of a network of NGOs that assist children and families from pathological surroundings. In that realm, we cooperate with the Svabodnaya Zhizn organization that prepared a conference in Novosybirsk in February 2007 addressed to Russian NGOs interested in joining the network. Twenty-one individuals from eight cities of the Russian Federation took part in the conference.

Regional Summer School

In June, we organized the thirteenth regional summer school Addiction, family and violence. It was held in Lviv with the participation of 45 therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists and other dependency specialists from the countries of the program’s operation. This time, the lecturers were not only from Poland, but also from Ukraine and Russia. This Summer School was organized with the help of our local partner – Center for Spiritual and Psychological Support and Mutual Aid Doroha from Lviv, which runs professional dependency therapy centers and is active in prevention and school education.

Seminars for journalists

In September, we organized a third seminar in Warsaw for journalists from the region, this time devoted to sources of pathologies threatening today’s youth. The three-day seminar entitled How to love a child? was co-organized with the specialists from the Polish foundation ABC XXI All of Poland Reads to Kids. Twenty-four journalists from Bulgaria, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan took part.

Other trainings, internships, study visits

In April, we organized a training in Warsaw for 30 individuals involved in the Alcoholics and Narcotics Anonymous movement from Armenia, Bulgaria, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Mongolia and Russia who work for consultation desks and hotlines or otherwise support individuals seeking dependency and codependency treatment. This training is prepared by individuals who have overcome addiction and want to help others. In some countries of the region people trained in this training have already been hired as the official ’dependency therapy instructors’.
In November, we organized a training in Warsaw for 20 Polish psychologists on preventing aggression in school. An American specialist from the Polish American Association in Chicago, who has worked with us since 2000, ran the workshops.
In December, in the town of Ragar in Tajikistan – at the initiative of a Tajik NGO – a training was organized for a group of Afghan physicians about the AA 12 steps and therapy programs based on working with the Narcotics Anonymous community.

Publications

In 2007, we published three issues of the ArkA bulletin (in Polish, Russian, and Bulgarian). We partially financed the completion of a book entitled Closer to Dreams containing works by children from the Ochota Culture Center in Warsaw, which will be published in 2008 by the Warsaw Section of the Polish Society for the Prevention of Drug Abuse. We prepared 100 education sets on CD-ROMs containing Russian translations of the 12 Consultant Functions, Dependency Recovery, and I Choose Freedom scripts.

In 2007, the program was financed by the Open Society Institute.

Total program costs PLN 580,412.46